


Aim

by quietaria



Category: Stella Glow
Genre: Gen, Humor, friendship?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-05
Updated: 2020-06-05
Packaged: 2021-03-03 18:46:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,697
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24550279
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/quietaria/pseuds/quietaria
Summary: As it turns out, spite is Mordi's greatest motivator.
Kudos: 10





	Aim

**Author's Note:**

> This isn't exactly an anniversary fic, per se, but I wanted to do something for the JP 5th anniversary, so I finished this fic I've been working on! I love this game so much... Based on a prompt by a friend: Write about how Mordi's challenged by Keith to marksmanship and then for once in her life starts putting effort into a craft and momentarily loses her sleepiness.

The most grating noise Mordi has ever been subjected to is the sound of Keith's guffaws as one of her shots veers sharply to the right and whizzes past her target, into a tree, sending a flock of birds twittering into the air in panic. It continues, unbidden, for another solid five minutes as Mordi shakes the feathers out of her hair.

"Shut up, Keith," she says under her breath.

"Let me show you how it's done," Keith says, and before Mordi can protest that she has no interest whatsoever in seeing, he notches an arrow and fires it off, piercing the straw dummy she was using as target practice. "There. You get it?"

"We don't even use the same weapon, _Keith_."

"What's that? You want me to teach you how to use a bow? Envious of my talents, are we-"

" _No_ ," Mordi hisses. "I don't, and I'm _not_." She tucks her rifle under her arm and marches away.

"Bend your elbows more!" Keith calls after her.

Her pace quickens.

\---

"Wow, you look mad," Sakuya remarks, glancing to the side at Mordi, brooding unpleasantly over her bowl of soup.

Mordi takes another mouthful of soup, saying nothing.

"Seriously, Mordi, what's the matter? You look like someone came in and smashed your pottery collection."

Mordi forcibly swallows her soup. " _Keith_."

"Ah."

"He was making fun of my aim," Mordi says sourly.

"Well, I mean-" Mordi glowers over the rim of her bowl. "I _mean_ , it's not like he's a master marksman himself, or anything. Just make him eat his words."

"... How?"

"Um, be better than him at shooting, obviously."

"How do I do that," Mordi asks flatly.

"Gee, I don't know," Sakuya says dryly. "Maybe, _practice_?"

At the utter lack of enthusiasm on Mordi's face, Sakuya shakes her head. "Oh, come on. Don't you want to wipe that smug look off his face? Not that I honestly think he's capable of any other expressions, but still."

Mordi meditates over a piece of carrot on her spoon.

"Fine." Her eyes glint, steely. "I'll show him."

\---

Her 500th clay target dummy finally complete, Mordi lines it up next to the others like a giant game of dominoes, and steps back until they're in shooting range. She raises her weapon to eye level and pulls the trigger.

Her first shot misses, and she twitches before consoling herself with the notion that she has yet to warm up.

She misses again. _Okay, still not warmed up_. And again. _Not quite_. She misses yet again-

Mordi tosses her rifle to the ground and plops face first into the dirt, groaning.

_What am I doing_ , she wonders to herself. _Why am I trying so hard to beat_ Keith?

The shriek of his chortles echoes through her brain, and she climbs to her feet, fists full of dirt, and grabs her gun.

Mordi will sooner eat the gravel underfoot than endure mockery from the likes of _Keith_.

She fires until her ammunition grows thin, then smirks smugly because, for once, she is utterly prepared. She feeds a handful of pellets crafted with earth magic in the approximate shape of bullets into the magazine, shaking them down like marbles.

Once again, she raises her gun to eye level and lets loose with a rhythmic barrage of bullets. The cacophonous sound of tempered clay shattering is oddly satisfying, even if most still end up unscathed, and Mordi is of half the mind to sculpt them in Keith's likeness next time, before deciding that fueling his narcissistic tendencies is bound to backfire on her.

It's only when Alto calls out her name from afar with his hands cupped to his mouth does she snap out from her reverie and blink at the expanse of clay fragments before her.

"What... what time is it, Alto?" Her throat is strangely parched and there's a numbness tingling on her palms.

"It's dinnertime, Mordi," Alto responds, concern evident in the furrow between his brows.

"Oh." That explains why she's been needing to squint to see her targets, and also why a hole has suddenly opened up in her stomach.

Mordi collapses onto the dirt for the second time that day, and Alto yells out in alarm, rushing over to help her up.

"Mordi, are you okay?!"

"... So tired... so hungry... can't take anymor..."

"Can you make it back to the barracks? Do you want me to carry you?"

Mordi lets out an exhausted groan of acquiescence, and Alto slings her over his back gently.

She doesn't have the strength to protest being hauled around like a piece of luggage and dozes off in the short interim before they reach their destination.

\---

Mordi finds her eyes darting open at the first crack of dawn, adrenaline flowing through her veins, uncertain if the wispy memories of shoveling bread into her mouth last night before falling face first onto the dinner table and into Hilda's soup were dream or reality.

"Gotta... practice..." she mumbles to herself, rolling out from underneath her fluffy comforter and onto the ground, where she stumbles to get ready in her sleepy morning daze.

"Mordi!" Popo exclaims bright-eyed, seated at the dining table with a warm mug of dandelion coffee between her hands. "You're up so early!"

"I'm... train..." Mordi murmurs incoherently, and wobbles to the counter to make toast.

"Wow!" Popo claps her hands together. "That's amazing! You're so dedicated, Mordi."

The sheer ludicrousness of being called _dedicated_ serves to wake her up better than any caffeine possibly could, and she eyes Popo blankly.

"What's the matter?" Popo beams back at her, and Mordi has to shield her eyes from the radiance, deciding to drop the subject, as ineloquent in her present state as she is.

It takes an eternity for her toast to finish cooking, nearly long enough for the sleepiness to reclaim her. Popo offers to make her a cup of dandelion coffee, to which she quickly and solemnly declines. At last, her toast finishes with a ding, and she brings the slices over to the table, where she proceeds to munch on them languidly.

She swallows her last bite and shoves the leftovers carelessly into her bag, rinsing off her plate and nodding resolutely to Popo enthusiastically waving her farewell.

The brisk morning air nips at her skin enough to make her shiver, but as she gets to work constructing her clay target dummies, she quickly forgets about the cold and everything else. Once again, she lines them up on the group, a veritable clay army, and readies her gun.

This round of target practice goes much more smoothly than the last, brittle clay flying in all directions as she continues her onslaught and discovers gleefully that more are being shattered than left unscathed.

She can already picture Keith's dumb face, mouth agape in apparent shock, forced to concede her talents as a far superior marksman, begging for her forgiveness-

The sounds of wood splintering and a sharp squeal take her out of her reverie.

"W-W-What the heck, Mordi? Are you trying to kill me?" Ewan asks, comically frozen in place from dodging her misfired bullet, thankfully lodged deep within a tree and not in Ewan.

"... Sorry. I wasn't paying attention." Ewan's abrupt appearance surprises her nearly as much as the realization that the sun is hanging directly overhead. "Not again," she mumbles, and her stomach rumbles on cue.

"You haven't eaten yet?" Ewan clears his throat and straightens himself back to normal.

"No," Mordi frowns. "But I have toast." She reaches into her bag and pulls out a slice leftover from breakfast. It tastes cold, dry, and rather salty- no wait, that's from her sweat. She eats it anyway.

Unaffected and used to stranger antics, Ewan shrugs and curiously surveys the surroundings. "So... you're training?"

Mordi nods, her cheeks stuffed with toast like a chipmunk.

"Huh." Ewan's eyes suddenly gleam with opportunity. "Well then, might I interest you in-" He shuffles through his rucksack. "This how-to guide to marksmanship?"

"That says 'Shooting for Dummies,'" Mordi scowls, taking a deep swallow.

"It's a fantastic resource, I assure you." Ewan grins, ever the businessman. "I'll even give you a friendship discount."

"Don't need it," Mordi says immediately.

Ewan pouts. "Aw, come on, it's a steal!"

"I'm not a dummy, and I don't need it," Mordi repeats stubbornly.

"Fine, fine," Ewan sighs, tossing the book back into his bag. "Well, good luck, then."

"Wait," Mordi says. "You use guns."

"Uh huh." Ewan blinks.

"So? How do you do it?" Mordi peers intently at him.

"You're asking me?" Ewan looks taken aback. "I'm a pretty confident shot, sure, but my expertise is more on the mercantile side of things."

"Tips." Mordi frowns. "Give me tips."

"You should really read the book-"

"No."

Ewan shakes his head, unfettered. "Oh, fine. Tips? Well... Make sure your gun is as steady as it can be. Sometimes I crouch for better balance."

"Crouch," Mordi murmurs, doing just that and scribbling it into the dirt.

"And wind can throw off your aim, so you can wait for it to subside or to compensate for it by adding an angle to your shots."

"Angle," Mordi grumbles.

"And... that's about all I can come up with on the spot, Mordi."

"That's fine." She pauses. "Thanks, Ewan."

"You're welcome. Why the sudden interest in marksmanship?"

Her lips pursed, she considers the best way to describe how utterly infuriating Keith's laughter is, especially when directly at her, as well as how deeply she yearns to make him eat his own words. Verbally, Mordi hisses "Keith."

Like Sakuya, Ewan gives her a simple "ah" and says no more, wisely. "Yeah, good luck. Let me know if you want to buy the book, 'kay?"

"I won't," Mordi responds stoutly. "Thanks. I'm going back to training."

Ewan gives her a nod, and she wipes the dirt off of her fingers before returning to her post.

Kneeling on one leg, her knee comfortably pressed against the familiar dirt, she steadies her gun with both hands, anchoring one elbow on her bent leg. The wind whistles across the open field for a brief moment, and once it passes, Mordi lets the silence persist for a second longer, then shatters it with a hail of bullets.

\---

Covered in mud, Mordi drags herself back to the barracks instead of waiting for Alto to come looking for her again once night falls and the squawk of a bird returning to its nest brings her back to her senses.

Dinner doesn't usually taste so good (and it being purple has nothing to with it, of which Mordi is 85% sure) and she cleans her plate to Lisette's delight long before the others are finished.

"Wash up and get a good night's sleep, okay, Mordi?" Lisette says, ushering her out the dining room. "I know you've been putting in an awful lot of effort lately."

Her brow bunches up as she wonders who exactly has been talking about her, but Lisette has always put it upon herself to be in the know of the happenings going on in their ragtag little group so that she can prevent chaos from reigning, or so Mordi believes.

Shortly after, Mordi drops her head onto her pillow and scarcely has time to pull one of her haniwa-shaped dolls to her chest before falling fast asleep.

The next day passes in a similar fashion; Mordi wakes up before the sun has peeked over the horizon, eats a quick breakfast, then lugs herself over to the field where she constructs even more clay targets and fires away at them once they're completed. 

The clay shards strewn across the field like a rug fill her with a sense of accomplishment. On another occasion, it might have been loss instead at the sight of her precious creations being destroyed, but Mordi had formed these targets out of clay for that express purpose, and as she concentrates and forms the rubble back into a spherical mass, a part of her is oddly looking forward to repeating the cycle the next day.

Which she does, over and over again, to the point where she's out in the fields before even Archibald has started on his patrols or tilling of dirt- Mordi truthfully has no idea what it is that he does, other than be loud and knightly.

Mordi is so swept up in her routine that she actually forgets the reason she started in the first place, only for the reason to come grinning toothily to her in the midst of her training.

"Ugh." At once, her expression sours and she tries to tacitly ignore the intruder, to no avail.

"Well, well, well," Keith says. "If it isn't Mordimort, hard at work."

"What do you want," Mordi asks flatly.

"I heard rumors of your newfound motivation and decided to see it for myself. And to think that my words could have inspired you this much." Keith sweeps his arm across the cluttered plain, his cape fluttering irritatingly along.

"You did _not_ inspire me," Mordi scowls. 

"Of course I did! Why else would you have gone to such great lengths to master marksmanship, were it not for the fact that you aspired to reach my levels of greatness?"

"As if I would-"

"And so the day has come at last! Come, show me the fruits of your labors."

"I-" Mordi accidentally bites her tongue and spends several seconds clutching her mouth in pain, while Keith waits wordlessly, his hands on his hips. " _Fine_. Competition." She raises her palms upwards and gathers the clay back into a ball, then rapidly constructs her target dummies, marking a straight line right through the middle with a ribbon of clay. "Whoever hits all their targets first is the winner." She's about to turn and march to her side, but stops and gives Keith a steely glare. "I _won't_ lose."

"We shall see about that," Keith chuckles, and takes his bow over to his spot.

"On three." Mordi's quiet voice carries over the still field. "One. Two. Three-"

At her own count, Mordi bends to one knee and steadies her gun in a single fluid motion, then takes aim and fires. Her shot explodes into her target and she immediately swivels to take aim at the next, closing one eye to maximize her accuracy. Her gun going off at regular intervals, Mordi again loses herself to the rhythm, not sparing even a single glance in Keith's direction, far too immersed in her task to do so. The remaining targets dwindle until at last Mordi strikes down the last one and exhales a deep breath she didn't realize she was holding in, and finally jumps to survey her competition.

On Keith's side, a quarter of the target dummies are still standing, and triumphant, Mordi lifts her arms in victory. "I did it!"

Keith watches her hop up and down and sighs dramatically, shrugging his shoulders, before breaking out in a grin. "Well down, Mordi." Keith pats the top of her head, which immediately takes the jubilation out of Mordi's step. 

" _Don't_ ," Mordi hisses, hackles rising like a slighted housecat. 

Keith observes her for a moment, not intimidated in the least. "You really are nothing like her."

"What?" Mordi blinks, momentarily surprised, before narrowing her eyes again. "Who are you talking about?"

"But nonetheless," Keith continues as if she hadn't spoken. "I do believe you've earned the right to become the fourth member of my kingdom. Rejoice, Mordimort!"

"Your kingdom?!" Mordi shouts. "I am _not_ joining your kingdom!"

"Do not jest, Mordi. You've gone to such lengths to prove yourself, and worthy you are. You will make a fine minister."

"I- I will not- I will _never_ -" Indignation coupled with fatigue makes it difficult for Mordi to form her words, but she gesticulates wildly in protest as Keith pinches the bridge of his nose and waves off her complaints.

"No... no mor... can't take any mor Keith," Mordi mumbles to herself, and begins racing back to the barracks, stumbling over every other step in her hurry to get away.

"Wait, my subject! Your king commands you!" Keith follows closely in her footsteps.

Mordi breaks into a sprint.


End file.
